In this blog post, we will examine why Augustine believed that human happiness cannot be achieved without love and faith in God.
Augustine’s Way to Happiness
Augustine says that ethics is the pursuit of the highest good. The highest good is the standard that determines how we should act, and it is a good that is an end in itself, not a means to other ends. When we attain this highest good, we attain happiness.
Then what is the happiness that Augustine speaks of? The happiness that Augustine speaks of is love for what one loves, that is, love that includes all forms of desires and aspirations. What we love is what we want, and we strive to obtain it. He says that by obtaining love, we can achieve happiness. Furthermore, Augustine argues that in order for us to be happy, what we truly love must be good. He emphasizes that the highest good is God, going beyond the views of earlier pagan philosophers, and says that true happiness can only be achieved when we meet God in the afterlife. We must love God, who is superior to us, and therefore only the Christian faith guarantees eternal happiness for all human beings, both in soul and body.
Augustine expressed this happiness with the biblical concept of “beatitude.” This refers to the state of happiness felt by a virtuous person, who becomes one with God and whose needs and desires are completely fulfilled. The concept of happiness felt by such virtuous people can be said to come from spiritual virtue, as claimed by the Stoics. However, while the Stoics claimed that virtue alone can bring humans closer to happiness, Augustine argued that human ability alone is not enough and that we must accept God based on faith in order to achieve happiness.
Augustine believed that virtue alone cannot be the highest good. This is because virtue comes from loving something beyond oneself. The highest good must not be destroyed by human will, and therefore, it is God, and only God can be considered the true good. That is why Augustine says, “Virtue is nothing other than perfect love of God.”
By loving a God who is superior and more excellent than ourselves, we can draw closer to God and ultimately attain happiness. According to Augustine, unlike the material world, which is created and destroyed, God is perfect, eternal, and completely good. The way to happiness that Augustine proposes is to know and love what is perfectly good and capable of being loved.
Augustine says that love for God takes four forms. “Temperance is love that keeps oneself healthy for God and does not fall into corruption. Courage is love that willingly endures everything for God. Justice is love that serves only God and, in doing so, governs all other people well. Prudence is love that discerns well what is helpful and what is harmful in the path toward God.”
Augustine also believed that humans cannot love God unless they love themselves. This is because those who pursue the highest good will also come to love themselves appropriately in the process. Similarly, loving one’s neighbor as oneself requires an effort to consider others so that they may also pursue the highest good. Love for God serves as a moral principle.
Augustine’s evil
Augustine’s experience of evil began when he grew up and felt sexual desire and indulged in it. This desire continued to plague Augustine throughout his youth and his life as a Christian. He believed that he would only find satisfaction when he transcended these physical desires and attained peace in his self and the truth.
Later, Augustine encountered Manichaeism, which taught that the universe was in conflict between darkness and light. This conflict also existed within humans, with light seeking salvation and purification, and darkness swallowing light with physical desires. Sexual desire was considered the most cunning desire, preventing light from emanating from the body and spreading to heaven. Good desires and evil desires were seen as coming from opposing souls and wills within humans. Manichaeism defined evil as the ineradicable power of an evil god that had existed in the material world since the beginning, and said that humans were not responsible for their evil deeds. This is because, in any case, it is darkness, which humans cannot control, that compels them to do evil. However, this dualism made Augustine feel that it did not provide a sufficient answer to the problem of evil. Augustine struggled even more with Manichaeism’s doctrine, which defined light as a force for good but viewed it as passive and powerless. In order to resolve the question of why evil exists in a world ruled by an omnipotent God, he came to believe that good and evil are two separate material entities that struggle against each other. He believed that God, as the creator, has the will and ability to root out evil and cut off its branches, thereby transforming evil into good. This idea challenged the concept of God’s omnipotence and existence.
Later, Augustine read some of Plotinus’s books. He accepted Plotinus’s view that evil is not a real entity but a lack of goodness. He understood evil as the loss or deficiency of the perfection or nature that natural things must have.
If evil existed as a real entity, then the responsibility for it would fall on God, the creator. In response to this, Augustine argued that God, the creator, originally created the world as good, but due to the natural tendency of creatures to return to nothingness, deficiencies arose and the phenomenon of evil appeared. Therefore, he denied that God was responsible for evil and rejected the idea that evil was an independently existing entity.
Augustine’s sexual ethics
Augustine follows the Christian tradition that physical relations between men and women should only take place after marriage, and that the purpose of marriage should be procreation. However, while some Christians view marriage as a corruption, Augustine sees it as part of God’s plan and a true good.
Augustine believed that sexuality could be divided into two states: before and after the Fall. He believed that offspring were not born out of sexual pleasure, but out of a companionate relationship. He believed that sexual union did not originate from sexual desire, but was the result of acting according to one’s will. Although these sexual acts were not completely free from lust, he did not believe that they were driven by lust. He believed that human self-control could control the involuntary functions of the body, and argued that although humans after the Fall could not control their desires, humans before the Fall were able to control them sufficiently. Augustine says that it is not the genitals or sexual relations through them that are shameful, but rather the loss of personality that occurs when men and women engage in sexual relations. He sees such involuntary, lustful sexual relations as the cause of shame.
Our understanding of sexuality after the Fall must begin with the shame felt by Adam and Eve. What Adam and Eve tried to cover was not simply their nakedness. At that time, the genitals themselves did not cause shame. What caused shame was the fact that sexual beings disobeyed, and that sex, which should follow rational will, ignored it and violated the order. This does not mean that the entity itself is evil, but rather that the disorder caused by the lack of ability of the human soul is evil.
Augustine says that socially respectable marriage and Christian marriage eliminate the shame associated with sexual intercourse. This is because marriage is honorable and leads to good without falling into evil. He says, “There are three goods of marriage: the first is the procreation of children, the second is the confirmation of love, and the third is the unity that comes from union.” Augustine explains these three goods, saying that the first is fertility, or the birth of children, the second is faith, sincerity, fidelity, love, or the confirmation of love. Finally, the third is vows or sacramental union. In particular, through the second good, Augustine expressed marriage as a means of restraining or remedying sin. This can be seen as God creating the institution of marriage to protect and control humanity in its fallen state. Augustine’s view that marriage is a remedy for sin is consistent with the Christian understanding that human life is destined for salvation.
Augustine’s ethics of war
Augustine basically had a theory of just war. He believed that war is evil, but when it is fought to prevent a greater evil, it is a just war. He said that war is a means to pursue peace. He said that a state must participate in war if it is necessary to defend itself or to punish serious injustice.
Furthermore, Augustine gave religious authority to war. When faced with the issue of war, he believed that war becomes just because God commands it. Through divine authority, he said of Moses, “What he showed in the war carried out by God’s command was not cruelty, but obedience.” Here, God’s command seems to justify war.
Augustine speaks of the evil of war and focuses on punishing that evil. “In general, when force is required for punishment, good people may wage war for obedience to God or by some legitimate authority.” He said this, believing that the violence that inevitably occurs in war is not a means of self-defense, but is carried out with legitimate authority and as an effort to punish.
Augustine viewed war as a form of religious education and had two perspectives: divine power and the execution of judgment. He believed that war was a righteous war when it rebuked human pride, made people humble, and was carried out in obedience to God. This was a test of human endurance and a way to train the soul, and he believed that it would bring blessings. This perspective can be understood as simply correcting human behavior from a spiritual point of view, rather than viewing war as an evil act committed by humans.
Furthermore, Augustine clearly states that “those who wage war in accordance with God’s authority are not to be blamed, and those who know that God never makes wrong demands should not be blamed.” God’s authority guarantees that our actions are justified when we act righteously.
He says that war is a sign of God’s mercy because it destroys evil that must be eradicated, is carried out for good reasons, and ensures that righteous rule is established. The important point of Augustine’s just war is not whether the act is violent or not, but whether the tendencies and desires are fundamentally just and whether moral order is maintained. If such moral order exists, it is the basis for justifying violence. This understanding is close to the epistemological and ethical characteristics of the New Testament.
Augustine’s political ethics
Augustine presents the “kingdom of God” and the “kingdom of man” and develops his political philosophy based on a dualistic framework. For him, the “kingdom of God” is a country based on Christian teachings. In contrast, the “kingdom of man” on earth is a country tainted by human greed.
In this regard, Augustine argues that political authority is inevitable. This is because humans are born with an evil nature, and politics is necessary to control it. Augustine explains politics as a relationship of domination and obedience. He also argues that even good people who believe in God need appropriate control. This represents a realistic view of politics.
Augustine dealt with “love” from a social perspective. In a world governed by eternal law, there may be authorities, husbands, parents, masters, and rulers, but he believed that they should not simply wield power, but should be people who care for those under their command, including their children and slaves, with love. He believed that if the natural order is disrupted, either restraint or punishment will follow. His eternal law is divine reason or the will of God, which maintains the natural order and punishes those who interfere with it. Augustine believed that people with evil intentions cannot obey the eternal law of love for God and love for one’s neighbor. In addition, he accepted slavery, explaining the circumstances of the time and attempting to justify it. Although Augustine did not explicitly condemn the sacrifices caused by slavery, he accepted the rules of war that justified its beginning and continuation. He was able to justify slavery because he saw it as a moral commandment or an application of eternal law.
Augustine explains that the people are subject to customs and laws, and that the general consent of society is obedience to the ruler. Such a republic enables the ruler to unite the people, and ultimately the ruler becomes the center. Augustine knew that political leaders used religion to deceive the people and possess them as subjects. However, he saw this as an attempt to maintain honesty, like a kind of social contract, in that politicians tried to treat others, especially the people, with appropriate behavior in order to maintain balance.
On the other hand, he draws on the rules of the republic established by Cicero and argues that “if the republic is the common good of the people, and if the people have knowledge of justice and that justice is derived from that knowledge, then without justice there can be no people, no community, and no republic itself.” From this point of view, he criticizes Rome as no longer a republic. No matter how great an empire Rome may be, a country without justice cannot be a republic. Here, justice is interpreted in the Platonic sense as justice itself, or the idea of justice, and it is believed that all temporary things must be judged as to whether they are just.
Augustine’s political ethics can be approached from various angles, between Christian norms and political insights, and can be seen as understanding human sin and considering the connection between real life and Christianity.
